Top 10 Worst Celebrity Endorsed Games

TT10October 25, 2012Comments Off

You could almost forgive some of these calamities in licensed gaming if these celebs were hard up or if their particular profession didn’t pay too well. These games are some of the worst ever, and the celebrities that put their name on the box should be ashamed.

10. Keith Chegwin: Chegger’s Party Quiz

This came out in 2007, no really, on the PS2 and the Wii. Nobody to this day can explain why this happened. Making a game can’t be cheap, even if you do use a has-been celebrity and really poor graphics.

9. Revolution X

Aerosmith put their name to an arcade game. Surprisingly, it was pretty good. Until they translated it to SNES and Sega Saturn. A weak plot, messy graphics, sluggish controls and enemies that all looked the same. It was disastrous.

8. Mary-Kate and Ashley: Magical Mystery Mall

Misery Mall, more like. The only mystery here is how anyone gave this the green light, with its pointless side tasks and wretched music. OK, it might be mildly entertaining for tweenies but within months of playing, even they will hang their heads in shame.

7. 50 Cent: Blood on the Sand

The rapper starred in this game as a bad parody of… himself. He and the G Unit crew have to retrieve a diamond skull, gang war style – take that, stereotypes! Fight action is monotonous and easy. Unfathomably, Fiddy has to do his own driving.

6. Steven Spielberg: Director’s Chair

This point and click catastrophe from 1996 was described by the man himself as, “a film school in a box”. Quentin Tarantino and Jennifer Anniston ‘star’ in this tedious game. There was so much time spent on trivial stuff like deciding camera angles, that it would put anyone off getting into the film industry.

5. Charlie’s Angels

The game bears no resemblance to either of the films; in fact it doesn’t seem to have a story arc at all. Just lots of button mashing fight sequences, with no difference between the three characters (played by Cameron Diaz, Drew Barrymore and Lucy Liu). Only play on mute – the music and banshee cries will make your ears bleed.

4. Tony Hawk: Ride

The skateboarding genius lost his Midas touch with this 2009 game that required a skateboard peripheral to play. The trouble was, the board was around £100 and you could only use it with this game. Which wouldn’t have mattered too much if the board sensors worked well enough. But they didn’t. The first version of the game sold 114,000 copies and the second only managed a paltry 3,000.

3. Michael Jordan Chaos in the Windy City

In what topsy-turvy world would a basketball player need to save fellow players who have been kidnapped? Michael Jordan. He accomplishes this by throwing basketballs, which have special powers (of course) at them. OK, well that could happen. We wish that were the only weirdness – zombies, eels, and the bosses…? They’re made of basketballs.

2. Shaq Fu

Another legendary basketballer, Shaquille O’Neal, made an outing in this ridiculous game back in 1994. From the very start, with possibly the most awful introduction to a game in the history of ever, this game disappoints and bewilders. Why is Shaq a martial arts expert? Why is he fighting cat women, monsters and mummies?

1. Home Improvement: Power Tool Pursuit!

You might not recall the 1990s sitcom Home Improvement. Lucky you. No, in fairness, it had its charm and was quite amusing, but that’s where it should’ve ended. Tim Allen (known to younger readers as Buzz Lightyear) thought that we probably hadn’t had enough DIY-based adventure, so SNES released this dreadful modified-tools-as-weapons game. With dinosaurs. Nope, don’t know.

This list was compiled by the team at Ladbrokes Games. Have we missed any celebrity endorsed gaming failures? Let us know in a comment.